Tenchi Muyo! Universe #2
The Time of Rage
by Ewen "Ryoga" Cluney

DISCLAIMER: Tenchi Muyo! Ryo-Ohki and the characters, places, 
etc. therein are trademarks of AIC/Pioneer LDC; this work is not 
intended to be a challenge to any such ownership, and may be 
distributed freely, in unmodified form.

     Author's Note: The main character in this story is Commander 
Sarnd, an officer from the Galaxy Police. He appears in episode 
#4 of the OAV series (the cat guy), and again in episode #13 and 
is killed in the beginning of Tenchi Muyo! In Love. In it, he 
tells Mihoshi the story of his first real case, when he and his 
partner confronted a powerful entity known as Rage...

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     Mihoshi stood in the lobby of the Commander's office. She 
wasn't sure just why Commander Sarnd had called her, but it had 
to be important. Who knew? Maybe there was some important assign-
ment he had for her, something top secret that only she could do! 
Or maybe... maybe he was attracted to her and wanted to tell her 
in secret! But he was a Thurnian and she a Kizakan. And he was so 
much older than him, and it would be so... so weird!.
     "How embarrassing!" she laughed, nearly bouncing up and down 
without even realizing it.
     The secretary looked at her, and sighed. "Detective Mihoshi, 
you can go in now."
     Mihoshi turned, and tripped, yelping feebly as she did so.
     "The Commander will see you now."
     It took a moment, but Mihoshi picked herself up, and stepped 
into the officer. The Commander regarded her with his yellow cat 
eyes, and sighed.
     "Sit down, Detective."
     Quite nervous, Mihoshi managed a salute, and sat down in the 
chair set in front of the Commander's desk.
     "Do you know why I asked you here?" he said, picking up a 
folder, thick with papers.
     "Umm... no sir."
     "This is regarding your last case, Mihoshi. Ordinarily 
Kurata would debrief you, but I have a few things to discuss with 
you, especially since this was your first assignment." He held up 
the folder. "This folder contains all the documents relating to 
the case, excepting your report. Do you know what these papers 
are, Mihoshi?"
     She shook her head.
     "Roughly half of these are general complaints. The other 
half are damage claims."
     "Oh."
     Sarnd set the folder down, and took a sip of coffee. "I 
would ask you where you learned to pilot a shuttle like that, 
except I know that it was at the galactic police academy, so 
instead, I'd like to know how you messed it up so badly."
     "Well, sir," she said, beads of sweat forming on her brow. 
"I only made a few little mistakes..."
     "Like crashing into a space station? Or panicking while 
wielding a high-powered proton cannon?"
     Mihoshi couldn't think of anything to say to that.
     "Since you obviously need to know a bit about what real 
police work is about, I want to tell you a story."
     Mihoshi calmed down a little bit, and looked at him hopeful-
ly. "A story? How fun!"
     Sarnd sighed. "This story isn't all that fun, but it is 
true. Now listen, and listen good; I want to tell you about my 
early days as a GP officer."

     Sarnd had come to hate the Vertix system. It consisted of a 
white dwarf star with twelve planets, one of which had a small 
mining colony on it. He had long dreamed of joining the Galaxy 
Police, to be out there in the field, stopping criminals and 
fighting the enemies of justice. Instead, he was partnered with a 
veteran GP cop and sent out here, the middle of nowhere. The Sol 
system would be more exciting, if only because of having to 
occasionally deal with Juraians.
     Sarnd and Fushikan sat on either side of the cockpit of 
their shuttle. Where Sarnd was a hulking Thurnian with a mane of 
brown hair, Fushikan was a black-haired Kizakan of average build. 
While Sarnd had only been on the force for a year, Fushikan was a 
veteran, having been a detective for the past 20 years. Both of 
them felt they had been wronged in being given this assignment. 
Sarnd had been fresh out of the academy, one of the best in his 
class, and Fushikan was one of the best on the force. Out of 
sympathetic angst, the two of them got along famously, although 
the majority of their discussions contained numerous insults to 
the guys in the "Eggbeater", the massive, oddly-shaped space 
station that served as the central command of the Galaxy Police.
     It was an average day on patrol, which meant it was inces-
santly dull. Sarnd looked at his control cube. It was a pink cube 
about four or five inches across. When you grabbed one side and 
twisted, a joint would form out of nowhere for a brief moment, 
and then would be gone once the turn was finished. The cube was a 
relatively new technology, only recently made a part of the 
standard equipment of a GP officer, and Sarnd had yet to see why; 
the most he could ever get the thing to do was materialize a cup 
of coffee or, if he was doing really well, accidentally cause 
dimensional anomalies to appear in the ship's hull.
     The cube was supposed to be capable do advanced dimensional 
manipulation, but no one had ever bothered to explain to him how 
the hell he was supposed to do that, much less why. The instruc-
tion manual used entirely too much scientific terminology (dimen-
sional physics wasn't exactly his area of expertise), and classes 
on the use of the cube had yet to be administered.
     Sarnd turned the cube over in his hand, looking at his 
reflection in its faces, then finally crammed it back in his 
pocket.
     "So," said Sarnd, "where are we, exactly?"
     Fushikan sighed and looked at the readout. "We're approach-
ing Vertix XII, another routine sweep."
     "They're having us do another sweep of the insignificant 
lump of rock!"
     The Kizakan nodded. "You got it. More bureaucracy. But at 
least we're getting paid for all this."
     Sarnd thought about his last paycheck, and frowned. "Kind 
of." He was glad he lived on a spaceship most of the time with 
the money he was getting; he couldn't afford much otherwise.
     Sarnd looked at the ornament hanging just in the middle of 
the forward viewport. It was a tiny, cartoony feline creature. He 
hated it, and Fushikan knew it. Fushikan always said that the 
ornament was a reminder of his old partner, a Thurnian named 
Drell. He said if Sarnd ever got to be as good as Drell, he could 
do whatever the hell he wanted with the ornament, but until then, 
it would stay.
     They had done a lot of stranger things to their shuttle too 
over the past year. Together, the two partners had killed the 
obnoxious personality of the ship's AI unit, so that it wouldn't 
talk to them all the time. Neither of them could stand the stupid 
thing, so getting rid of it was something tacitly agreed upon and 
carried out with brutal efficiency.
     The tiny shuttle came down for a look at the minute plane-
toid that passed for Vertix XII. Of all the worlds in the Vertix 
system, it was one of the more worthless ones, barely the size of 
an average moon.

     "Um, sir?"
     Sarnd looked at Mihoshi and sighed. Damn rookies. he 
thought, and then amended, No, Damn Mihoshi. "Yes?"
     "Um, why are you telling me all this?"
     Not sure why he should bother continuing, Sarnd rubbed is 
wide nose. "Maybe you could listen and find out?"
     "Um, oh yeah."

     On Vertix XII there was nothing. Well, practically nothing. 
The planet had some deposits of nickel, ice, and iron, and might 
be mined some day. There was also a remote scanner unit stationed 
there. It was a solar-powered unit, run by an AI, which monitored 
the planet.
     Fushikan's hands played across the control console, and a 
moment later the ship's computer responded with "Crosslink estab-
lished."
     On the viewscreen the image of a standard galactic AI's head 
unit appeared. "Greetings. Enter authorization code now."
     Sarnd sighed; he hated the passcodes in the GP. It seemed 
wrong somehow, to be accessing top secret data, and say things 
like "and they all lived happily ever after" to get to it. But 
the eggbeater boys weren't about to change. He cleared his 
throat, and gave his authorization and password. "Authorization 
code Sarnd 00420083. Password begins now; 'humpty dumpty sat on a 
wall'. Satisfied?"
     The AI nodded. "Access granted. Hey there, how's it goin'?"
     "Just transmit." growled Fushikan.
     "Very well. Initiating datapulse sequence..."

     On the surface of the tiny planet, something stirred. It 
glowed a terrible red, to match the anger that permeated every 
fiber of its ethereal being.

     Suddenly, the screen went to static. It took both of them a 
moment to realize the implications of this. Either there was some 
kind of interference, the AI was malfunctioning, or the AI had 
been destroyed.
     Sarnd jumped to the communications console. "Unit 0752! 
Respond!" he barked. "Damnit, you stupid hunk of metal, respond!"
     Suddenly, the computer's alarms began going wild. Both of 
them scrambled to see what the hell was going on. "I'm getting a 
massive energy reaction!" called Fushikan. "Source unknown, type 
uncertain. We might just be in deep shit."
     Sarnd looked at the scanners. Whatever it was, it was big, 
and it was powerful. And it was close; very close. Sarnd gripped 
the controls, and hit the deceleration thrusters hard. Both of 
them were held in place by the gravity webs in their seats, but a 
number of small objects around the shuttle were thrown around the 
cabin. As they slid to a stop, a glowing crimson form sped past 
them. More warnings came on from the computer, about the poten-
tial danger of the situation.
     This was too much for the two of them to handle. Sarnd 
activated the communications console, and activated the hyperwave 
unit. A moment later, he was in contact with headquarters. "This 
is detectives Sarnd and Fushikan reporting. We have an emergency 
situation. An unknown, hostile energy form is present in the 
Vertix system. Requesting backup as soon as possible."
     Obviously inexperienced and a little panicked, the operator 
he'd reached worked furiously at her console. "Um, oh no. This is 
bad."
     "What!? What is it?!"
     "I regret to inform you that the closest ships are a week 
away at top speed."
     "So what the hell are we supposed to do?"
     Just then, the ship veered again; Fushikan was at the con-
trols, doing his best to avoid whatever it was.
     The tech's superior walked over. "Remain calm. We will 
dispatch help as soon as possible. Until then, do the best you 
can, run if you have to. I'm afraid that's all we can do for 
now." The officer sighed. "Good luck. You're going to need it."
     The screen went blank, and Sarnd landed his fist on the 
console. "Damn! What are we supposed to do?"
     "Well," said Fushikan, "one thing's for sure, we can't 
outmaneuver this thing forever, and I seriously doubt we could 
outrun it in a hyperspace corvette, much less this tub."
     Enraged, Sarnd armed full weapons systems. The shuttle was a 
standard patrol model, and equipped with a pair of photon cannon 
turrets, plus a small battery of missiles. Sarnd set the turrets 
to auto-track, and fired at the thing. The shots simply passed 
through. "No good." he muttered with frustration.
     He had to think. How did the GP usually deal with this sort 
of thing. He had heard stories about the criminal Kain, which had 
taken a joint effort between the Galaxy Police and Jurai to 
capture in subspace. If this thing was comparable, they were 
screwed in a big way.
     Sarnd looked at the scopes. It looked like a great, amor-
phous mass of red mist, with two glowing points for eyes. And it 
was gaining on them. Sarnd looked at the rear of the cabin; a red 
glow was coming over the rear section of the ship. The two glow-
ing, hateful eyes appeared there within the cabin. A voice, in 
Sarnd's mind rather than his ears, sounded. I AM RAGE.
     "Fushikan, I think we have a problem!"
     Fushikan paused to glance backwards and cursed.
     Sarnd looked at the engineering console, trying to think of 
something. The power flow control system was easy to operate, and 
he tried redirecting power to the drive system. With life support 
at minimum, gravity generators offline, and several other systems 
shut down, the drive output was more than tripled, and they 
quickly outran the creature.
     Fushikan turned to him and smiled. "Good work. Now all we 
need to do is keep this up for the next five days." Of course, 
the power generators would give out after 72 hours of this kind 
of abuse.
     "Well then," said Sarnd, "we have a maximum of three days to 
come up with a solution to this predicament."
     "Right, Sarnd. Always the positive thinker." Fushikan en-
gaged the automatic pilot, and stood up. "I suppose you've heard 
about the only comparable case I can think of -- Kain."
     Sarnd nodded gravely. "But if this were as powerful as 
Kain's supposed to be, we'd be dead already."
     "That's true, but it might be similar in nature, meaning 
that we couldn't possibly destroy it with anything here."
     "Kain was trapped in subspace, right?"
     Fushikan nodded. "In the Subspace Network. But we have no 
such capabilities, even with the help of the mining colony."
     There was a long pause. At last, Sarnd turned to the con-
sole. "Computer, evaluate situation, estimate chances of survival 
and suggest possibilities."
     The AI poked its robotic head out. Although it no longer had 
a personality, it was still quite functional. "Based on available 
data, chances of survival are negligible, and I can provide no 
possible means of attempting to resolve the situation."
     "Useless." muttered Fushikan. "As I thought."
     "Computer, theorize as to why the entity was unaffected by 
laser fire."
     There was a pause, after which the AI replied. "Uncertain. 
Photon weapons are known to have limited effectiveness against 
non-solid targets of any kind, but the composition of the entity 
is unknown. Possible spirit entity, meaning that it must be 
attacked using a weapon that functions through either subspace or 
the astral plane."
     "Not completely useless," said Sarnd, "but most definitely 
discouraging." The question was, how the hell were they supposed 
to fight a spirit? Such entities were insubstantial, capable of 
passing through solid matter, and frequently possessed psychic 
capabilities. Their shuttle simply wasn't equipped to deal with 
such things, mainly because of their rarity. If they plotted a 
course to rendezvous with the GP ships that were coming, the 
generators would burn out two days earlier, leaving the entity, 
Rage, a full day to find and kill the two of them. "As I see it, 
we do have one advantage over this thing."
     "Oh?"
     "It called itself Rage. I could feel the hatred radiating 
from it. The, well, the rage. Anything like that is not likely to 
have much in the way of self control. It's anger will cloud 
whatever little intelligence it might have, and it could easily 
make mistakes."
     "The question is, what mistakes would it make. If you're 
right, it's going to pursue us single-mindedly until it either 
catches us or sees something else to kill."
     The two of them sat down, and thought.
     The question was, how to hurt something that would have to 
be attacked from subspace. It would be really nice to have a 
graduate from the Science Academy here -- one of them could 
disintegrate the average spirit creature with a gesture. For that 
matter, a psychic would be nice too.
     The shuttle's FTL drive used a subspace inversion system. 
Neither of them really knew that much about it, but is was sup-
posed to surround the ship with an energy field that caused it to 
be shifted the tiniest bit into subspace, causing the normal 
reaction drives to be able to propel the ship about a hundred 
times faster. Such systems were normally reliable, although when 
they malfunctioned, the effects could be catastrophic.
     They reasoned that it might be possible to use the drives to 
affect Rage in some way. There were three problems with attempt-
ing to do so, however. Firstly, the drive system had a number of 
failsafes, which would have to be disabled before any such tam-
pering might be attempted. Second, they didn't really know what 
they would do with the drives, and third, any screw-up could 
easily kill them just as surely as Rage would.
     Getting help from the colony was not an option. It was a 
strictly civilian installation, populated entirely by Kizakans 
and Thurnians, and neither of the races was known to possess 
psychic or other such powers. A Juraian warrior would be helpful 
in this situation as well. Not that they were likely to encounter 
one in this century.
     "Where could we go that it can't?" asked Sarnd.
     "What do you mean?"
     "Well, maybe we could lure it somewhere that would be dan-
gerous for it to go?"
     Fushikan looked at the console, and pressed a few keys. 
"Hmm." He began looking through libraries. "You might be on to 
something, you know. According to the databank, spirits have been 
observed to be affected normally by gravitational effects. If we 
maxed out the structural integrity field, we could go inside 
Vertix IX, the gas giant, pretty deep. The gravity might just be 
enough to trap it."
     "It's worth a shot."
     The two of them got ready at the controls. Fushikan made a 
wide turn, and then plot a course straight for Vertix IX. "It'll 
take about twenty-three minutes to get there." He announced.
     The two of them were too nervous for words, and remained 
silent the entire time. Fushikan watched the readouts. Sarnd 
glared at the kitty ornament.

     The shuttle plunged into the surface of the gas giant, and 
the creature followed, just as they thought it would. The view-
ports showed only flashes of green and orange, and colors in 
between, but they could feel that Rage was near. Its very 
presence made them anxious.
     This time, it was the structural integrity fields that 
received the bulk of the ship's power output, so that the tiny 
shuttle could withstand the massive pressure and incredible 
gravitational forces that were gripping at its hull. They contin-
ued to plunge deeper and deeper, and after more than a minute, 
they came out the other side. Once there, they hit the boosters, 
and sped away from the planet.
     "I think we did it." said Sarnd, looking at the rear scope.
     "Don't make assumptions."

     Within the planet, Rage fought desperately against the 
gravity that clung to its ethereal form with such strength. It 
pulled itself out past the surface partly, then slipped back in, 

but kept fighting, and pulled out again, and finally freed itself 
from the planet.

     "Damn!" Sarnd's fist slammed down on the console. "Now what 
are we supposed to do?"
     Fushikan looked at him, and sighed. "Try something else. 
That's all we can do."
     Sarnd closed his eyes, and nodded. Fushikan was right; they 
could never give up. That was the one and only certainty in this 
situation. "An attack from subspace..." Sarnd walked to the back 
of the cabin, and fished out the control cube's instruction 
manual. He had yet to learn the subtle nuances of the cube's 
operation, but, no time like the present. "Let's see,"
     "You're not thinking of trying to use that damn cube, are 
you?" Fushikan snorted.
     Sarnd ignored him, and kept looking in the manual. Finally, 
he found the section on subspace, and began reading furiously.
     The cube could shift one person into subspace if desired, 
but doing so was not advisable, because of the risk of becoming 
lost there, possibly permanently. Sarnd decided it beat the risk 
of being killed, definitely permanently. The sequences for this 
weren't all that difficult anyway. Theoretically, normal attacks 
made while in subspace would affect spirit creatures.
     "I've got it." Sarnd went to the cargo area, and pulled out 
a battlesuit. The GP battlesuit was a flexible armor suit, which 
provided incredible versatility of movement, full environmental 
protection, and powerful armor protection, as well as a multi-
energy blaster weapon in the hand. To this he added the heavy 
proton cannon, which was to be used only in extreme circum-
stances, and an antigravity pack for greater mobility.
     Suited up and equipped, Sarnd stepped back into the cabin.
     "You're nuts." said Fushikan.
     "Listen. With the cube, I can go into subspace, and attack 
from there. I need you to slow down and match speed with it."
     Fushikan looked at him gravely. "You're really going to try 
this. I can see that there's no way to dissuade you." He punched 
the controls, and the creature loomed closer. "It's only a kilom-
eter away." Fushikan said at last.
     Sarnd nodded, and pulled out the cube.

     Sarnd had never been in subspace before, and what he had 
heard about it wasn't good. Subspace was a level of existence in 
which the effects of inertia are virtually nonexistent, and the 
gravitational constant is different. What few bothered to tell 
you about was what it looked like.
     It was black. A blackness that surrounded you, that seemed 
to try to get into you. A blackness that left you disoriented and 
scared.
     But Sarnd knew he had more important things to worry about. 
Apart from himself, there were only two things he could see; a 
faint image of the shuttle, and the great red mass, which seemed 
to be far more solid now. It was as though here it existed fully, 
whereas its appearance in the physical world was a pale reflec-
tion of this.
     Sarnd readied the proton cannon, its capacitors quickly 
reaching full, and fired. A barrage of proton bursts struck the 
great red thing, making black holes where it struck. He took one 

hand off of the cannon, and activated the suit's multi-blaster. 
The weapon automatically scanned and chose the most effective 
setting for the target, and after a second, a barrage of green 
energy bolts flew forth from the hand of the suit. The combina-
tion stopped the thing where it was, and continued to fill it 
with holes. It writhed in pain, and Sarnd continued firing. 
Finally, the proton cannon's power cells were forced to go to 
recharge mode, so he kept up with the suit's blaster.
     But finally, that too gave out. For a brief moment, all was 
silent. Rage was still in the darkness. "Did I kill it?" Somehow, 

Sarnd suspected that was not the case.
     It wasn't.
     Rage surged forward, engulfing Sarnd with its crimson mass. 
He couldn't breathe, could barely move, and had trouble thinking 
properly. His comparatively frail form was wracked, energy pulled 
from the cells of his body, and his mind was filled with a terri-
ble anger, and unreasoning hatred. He fought against it, and 
pulled out his cube. Straining every fiber of his being, Sarnd 
turned it, and was pulled back into normal space.
     He floated there, surrounded by stars, and realized that the 
red haze was still there, only far less strong. Its pull was very 
real, but not as debilitating. Sarnd activated the antigravity 
pack, and began to move towards the shuttle.
     "I wounded it. But I didn't come close to killing it."
     "Is that you Sarnd?" The voice was Fushikan's, and was 
coming over the radio.
     Sarnd nodded out of reflex. "Yeah, it's me. I'm inside the 
thing right now."
     "And you're alive?"
     "Yeah, barely. I think it's decided to leave me alone for 
now, though."
     Sarnd wasn't sure whether or not he really thought it would 
work, but it definitely hadn't. He drifted along, slowly moving 
towards the outer edge of Rage. As he came to the very edge, he 
was suddenly wracked by energy. He didn't scream, but he couldn't 
help but wince.
     "Are you okay?" asked Fushikan.
     "N-no!" he growled. "En... energy attack..." Sarnd's vision 
went blurry, and he could barely move.
     On the edge of everything, he was aware of movement. It was 
the shuttle. It was coming straight towards him and it. In a 
fraction of a second, the shuttle sped by, and Sarnd was suddenly 
yanked away from the red cloud. He was dimly aware that the ship 
had been struck by the same red electric arcs that had affected 
him, only they were stronger.
     The next thing Sarnd knew, he was surrounded by a greenish-
blue glow, and was slowly moving towards the shuttle. It took 
nearly five minutes, but he was finally inside the cabin of the 
shuttle. On the floor.
     Fushikan stood over him. Sarnd tried to make his eyes focus 
again, but they refused to. His head hurt too, and he felt tired, 
as though he had just run a medium-sized marathon. "Ow."
     The Kizakan sighed, pulling out a medical scanner. "You 
nearly killed yourself out there, huh?"
     Sarnd managed a slow nod. He could hear beeping noises from 
the scanner, entirely too many of which sounded bad.
     "Well, there shouldn't be any permanent damage, but accord-
ing to this, you've suffered neurological trauma, and won't be 
able to do much for the next six hours. Plus you're suffering 
from exhaustion, and there's a little bit of tissue deterioration 
here and there." Sarnd heard a click; presumably the scanner 
being turned off. "Your armor's nearly gone too."
     Sarnd wanted to get up, to do something, but his body re-

fused to fully respond. And besides, he was exhausted. Sarnd 
drifted into a deep sleep.

     Sarnd was in a metal corridor. It was Kial Station -- the 
place where he was born. Not knowing why, he began walking. The 
people ignored him, and he ignored them.
     After many turns, he walked into a living space. It was 
furnished in a rather spartan manner. He looked around the room. 
There was a few hunting trophies, a crystal ball, and a mirror. 
He stopped at the mirror, and looked at his own reflection.
     It was himself, in his Galaxy Police uniform. Why am I here? 
As he looked into the mirror, it suddenly turned blood red. Out 
of anger, which came from nowhere, he struck the mirror. It 
shattered, but the entire room was overcome with the same red 
haze. He looked at his hand, and saw it was bleeding. The blood 
poured onto the floor, making a pool. He began drowning, gasping 
for air...

     Sarnd jolted awake. He found himself in the tiny medical 
unit that was located in the recesses of the shuttle. He looked 
at the monitor, which said that he was more or less restored to 
full health, although he should take it easy for the next 48 
hours. Not that the cared.
     Sarnd walked to the cabin; Fushikan was there, looking at 
the readouts. "Ah, you're awake."
     "Yes."
     Fushikan motioned for him to come closer. "Come here, look 
at this."
     Sarnd stepped closer and looked at the screen. It showed a 
plot from several different angles of when the ship passed 
through Rage.
     "See here," he said, pointing at the plot, "it seems that 
the subspace field generated by the inversion drives gives the 
ship a limited physical presence in subspace, so when I flew 
through it, it hurt the thing."
     Sarnd nodded. "But what did it do to the ship?"
     "That," said Fushikan, "is the problem. Its energy attack 
caused severe damage to the hull in several places. We could 
survive two more such passes at best."
     Sarnd sat down, and sighed. "Maybe..."
     "Eh?"
     He looked down at his clenched fist, and thought for a 
moment. "Maybe we're approaching this in entirely the wrong way."
     "What are you getting at, Sarnd?"
     He released the fist, but kept looking at the hand. "I have 
an idea." Sarnd stood up, and pulled out his cube.
     "Not that thing again."
     Sarnd turned to him. "The control cube is capable of dimen-
sional manipulation. If I work it right, I might be able to 
affect the space around the entity so that it enables us to use 
the ship's weapons."
     "But how the hell are you going to generate enough energy to 
do that?"
     He held up the cube. "The cube has no real limits in terms 
of power. It's just a matter of using it right."
     Fushikan's eyebrows raised. "You really think you can pull 
this off?"
     Sarnd nodded. "I'm certain of it." He began to turn the 
cube. After a few minutes of this, he announced, "That should 
just do it. Fire."
     Fushikan smiled, and brought the laser turrets to bear. 
After a moment's hesitation, he fired. The lasers cut a clear 
hole through the thing, and it recoiled in pain. Seeing the 
success he had, Fushikan put the lasers on rapid-fire, and let 
them spray the thing. Before long it looked like swiss cheese, 
and seemed to be collapsing in on itself, fading away.
     They both watched, and watched. It was gone.
     "We did it." he said at last. "Sarnd, we killed the thing." 
Fushikan checked the sensors. "It seemed to be too easy, though."
     Sarnd shuddered.
     "Gods..." muttered Fushikan. "We're in it now."
     "Damn. We almost had it."
     Fushikan looked at him confusedly. "What do you mean? Obvi-
ously it recovered,"
     "Do you know why you were able to hurt it?" said Sarnd, 
putting the cube away again.
     Fushikan watched him put the cube away, and shook his head.
     "It was because I got you to believe you could. The cube had 
nothing to do with it."
     "It's... it responds to our thoughts?"
     Suddenly, a warning light came on. Fushikan turned to the 
monitor, and maxed out the throttle. But this time it was faster 
than before, and again it appeared in the back of the cabin, far 
madder than before.
     There had to be a way out of this. It was affected by the 
thoughts and feelings it sensed. Sarnd thought of his dream. 
Aggression would lead to a counterattack, which would kill them. 
He remembered how he punched the crimson mirror, only to be 
killed in a swirling mix of red, his own blood and the mist he 
released from the mirror. There had to be a way out.
     It came closer and closer. The memory of when it had caught 
him in subspace was almost tangible, ready to repeat itself. 
Sarnd did his best to remain calm. As the red mist and the hate-
ful eyes crept forward, they went past him, towards Fushikan.
     "Fushikan. Stay calm."
     Fushikan turned around, and saw the mist that was mere 
inches away from him. Sarnd saw in his partner something he had 
never seen before; fear.
     "You have to stay calm. Think of... think of something 
peaceful."
     Fushikan closed his eyes and breathed deeply. "Meadow..." he 
murmured, "Kazak..."
     Slowly, very slowly, the glow of the twin eyes dimmed a 
little, and the crimson mist retreated.
     "That's right," said Sarnd quietly, "everything's just fine. 
It's just an average day on patrol. Boring as hell."
     Fushikan opened his eyes, and saw that the cabin looked 
quite normal. Slowly, he sat down.
     Sarnd went to the control console. Fortunately, he had been 
right about Rage, and, moreover, he had actually been able to get 
Fushikan to be calm. He programmed the computer to rendezvous 
with the nearest GP vessels, inform them of the nature of the 
creature, and tell them to prepare for a subspace capture. In the 

meantime, however, the two of them needed to be inactive.
     Sarnd pulled out his sidearm, set it to stun, and fired. 
Fushikan slumped in his chair. Sarnd carried Fushikan to the 
stasis pods, and put him and himself into the pods. As the stasis 
field activated, both of them were frozen in time, put into a 
dreamless sleep.

     Sarnd came to in a hospital bed. He sat up and looked 
around, trying to get his bearings. Whatever had happened with 
Rage, he had been rescued. Probably Fushikan too. "Where am I?"
     An AI unit, a model similar to that employed on GP space-
craft, but modified for medical purposes, popped out. "Detective 
Sarnd, you are currently in medical ward 6 of Galaxy Police 
Headquarters."
     He looked himself over; he was tired, but that was to be 
expected after going into stasis. "Being treated for what?"
     "You are suffering from subspace exposure, wide-spectrum 
tissue-damage, and acute exhaustion. Furthermore, you astral and 
overdimension patterns have been dangerously weakened, although 
those have already been repaired insofar as is possible."
     "What about Fushikan?"
     "Detective Fushikan was released from ward 10 yesterday. Do 
you want me to put you in contact with him? He requested that you 
contact him once you were able."
     Sarnd nodded.
     A comm unit popped up, and the image of Fushikan appeared on 
it. "Hey, Sarnd, how are ya'?"
     "I've been better. What happened?"
     Fushikan scratched his head. "As I understand it, you put us 
into stasis. When the support ships found us, they stuck Rage in 
the Subspace Network, and thawed us out. I was more or less fine, 
but with what you've been through, compounded by stasis shock, 
you're going to be in the hospital for another month, Detective."
     The last time Sarnd had checked, he was a sergeant. "What do 
you mean, 'detective'?"
     "Oh," said Fushikan, smiling. "I guess they haven't told you 
yet. You're a Detective First Class now. So am I; we both got 
promotions out of this whole affair. No more Vertix system for 
us; we get to do something that actually matters now."
     Sarnd smiled. "About time."
     "Well, I'll see you around."
     "Oh?"

     "Both of us are getting new partners."
     Sarnd thought about the prospect of having a new partner. 
Since he was supposed to be some kind of big shot now, they'd 
probably give him some rookie for a partner. If he was really 
lucky, he could get someone to do the paperwork for him, like 
Fushikan had always made him do. He would miss Fushikan, but 
somehow, he didn't think there was much reason to grumble any-
more. HQ had finally made good and given both of them some re-
spect for a change.
     "I have to go. Oh, one last thing, Sarnd. You can what you 
want with the kitty. You not only solved the whole caper and kept 
us from getting killed, but you actually got the drop on me! Not 
even Drell ever did that."
     Sarnd smiled. "You were wide open."
     Fushikan frowned. "Later, kid."

     After nearly an hour of storytelling, Mihoshi was getting 
visibly anxious. Sarnd had had to make sure she was paying atten-
tion several times.
     "Now, what do you think of that?"
     Mihoshi put her index finger and thumb to the side of her 
head. "Wow." she said at last. "What did you do with the little 
kitty?"
     Sarnd sighed. Somehow, he had expected that from her. He 
opened a drawer, and pulled out a small black box. Inside was the 
ornament, quite intact.
     "How cute!" she said with a sleight giggle.
     Sarnd closed the box, and put it back. "Uh, yeah. Listen to 
me, Mihoshi. You actually did a good job of solving this case."
     "I did?"
     He nodded. "The report is comprehensive, and you most defi-
nitely got the perpetrator. However, you also ran up an incredi-
ble bill in damages, and a lot of the citizens of Kalao aren't 
quite as supportive of the Galaxy Police as they used to be. You 
simply have to be more careful."
     Mihoshi nodded.
     "And that brings me to the other reason I asked you here." 
He pressed a button on his desk's control pad, and the doors 
opened. "Mihoshi, I'd like you to meet you new partner." A young 
woman, about the same age as Mihoshi, with long, black hair and 
sparkling green eyes walked into the office. "Mihoshi, meet 
Kiyone."

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by Ewen "Ryoga" Cluney (ryoga_hibiki@hotmail.com)
Tenchi Muyo! Universe Home Page:
http://www.geocities.com/Tokyo/6127/tenchi.html

Beware of pandas carrying signs.
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